I Suck At Titles
by Constipated Waffle
Summary: The story of a boy on a journey with his Nidoran to find his missing father. A companion to Sugarflier's Shedding Skins, but can be read without as well. T for character death later.
1. The Start Of a Journey

I Suck At Titles

Theodore took one last look at Hearthome City. He knew he wouldn't miss his old life at all. His foster parents were abusive, his friends all laughed at him when he devoted to life to finding his missing dad, the whole city laughed at him whenever he came up with some elaborate theory about why his dad went missing… he clutched his Poké Ball closer to his chest. Then he took his first step onto Route 208.

He thought about his dad. The former Champion. He knew he'd have big shoes to fill if he ever got to the Championship. He sighed, thinking about the last opponent his father ever faced. Cecil. The sunglasses-wearing, leather-jacket loving, all-around shady jerk. Their match was the closest for a Championship battle ever, but in the end, Cecil's Dragonite was defeated by his dad's Toxicroak.

Toxicroak was the third in a long line of Poison-type starters for Theodore's family, with his Grandpa's Swalot and his Great-Grandpa's Muk earlier in the family.

"_And I kept it in the family…"_ Theodore thought. He remembered all the fights he'd had with his dad. Theodore wanted a Rhyhorn, more than any other Pokémon in the world. But his dad wanted him to keep the Poison-type tradition in for a fourth generation.

"I followed your wishes, dad…" Theodore said, on the brink of tears, as he released his Nidoran from its Poké Ball. "Hey, Gary…" he greeted his new Pokémon. He kept the tradition of g names in his family, too.

The Nidoran sat there for a minute, then got up, stretched, and began looking around. There were a lot of wild Pokémon in the area, and Gary looked around for a minute before lashing out at a nearby Budew with a Peck attack, causing the Grass/Poison type to reel in pain. It tried to fight back with an Absorb, but Gary jumped over it and defeated it with another Peck.

A nearby Bidoof angrily attacked back, but a single Double Kick to the face knocked it out. A Meditite's Confusion attack managed to slow him down, but another Peck attack knocked it out as well. Gary returned to his astounded trainer, happily rubbing his horn against Theodore's leg.

"Wow…" Theodore gasped in astonishment. "I thought I'd need to train you up, but it looks like you already have enough power to take on a gym." Gary nodded and curled up around his leg. "We'll still need two more Pokémon before we can face a gym leader, though."

Just then, a Ralts Teleported nearby. Theodore gasped, knowing how rare Ralts were in the Sinnoh region. He thought about how much fun he could have with an awesome Gallade. He had fantasies about taking on the tournament with a full-fledged, super awesome Psychic/Fighting type.

Unfortunately, Theodore was so busy thinking about the fun he could have, he forgot to throw a Poké Ball, and the Ralts Teleported away to who-knows-where. Theodore stood standing there for a second before falling down and curling up into the fetal position.

Gary moved away from Theodore's feet and used his horn to pat Theo's back in a "there, there" sort of way. Theodore sat down for a few more minutes before standing back up, sniffing, and smiled softly.

"You- You're right, Gary," he said, regaining his composure. "We just have to go find an even more awesome Pokémon to catch! We're gonna go out there, find some new, good Pokémon. And then we're gonna go CHALLENGE THE GYMS! Now, we're gonna go catch a new Pokémon!"

**4 Hours of them not catching a new Pokémon later**

"So many critical hits…" Theodore sighed, sitting down by their campfire glumly. They had tried everything, from toning down Gary's hits so they wouldn't do much damage, to not using any attacks period [at which point the Starly they were facing's attack activated Gary's Poison Point ability], but they ended up knocking out everything they faced before Theodore could throw a Poké Ball at it.

Theodore sighed as crawled into his sleeping bag, with Gary crawling in behind him. "We'll try to catch another Pokémon in the morning…" Theodore said as he drifted off to sleep.

Between his weird dreams about ice cream hot dogs and Quagsire/ Mightyena offspring, he had an oddly realistic dream about his dad.

"Dad?" Theodore said, looking up at his former guardian.

"Son, I haven't got much time but I want you to know-" his dad was suddenly disappearing into the deep banks of his mind.

"Dad? DAD?" Theodore screamed as his father faded and was replaced by a giant version of Cecil.

"Ha ha! You wanna talk to your dad, kid? TOO BAD! You'll never see your dad again, and it's all thanks to me! And now, I'll take care of you!"

All of a sudden, Theodore woke up and felt a bit of pain in his leg. He opened his eyes and saw a concerned looking Gary staring back at him.

"It- It's okay, Gary, you can go back to sleep," Theodore said. Gary nodded and crawled back into the sleeping bag while Theodore laid his head back down on his pillow.

He started thinking about his weird dream. Why was he having such realistic dreams? And what was his dad going to say to him? He thought about this a bit longer before sleep took him back to the land of weird dreams.

When he woke up in the morning, he yawned, stretched, and reached down into the sleeping bag and pulled out Gary.

"Good morning, Gary!" Theodore said happily, hoping he could put his dreams on the back burner while he tried to catch some new Pokémon. Gary remained completely silent, his eyes following something nearby. Theodore followed his eyes and found a Weedle, crawling directly next to his sleeping bag and not paying much attention.

"New Pokémon!" Theodore shouted. He attempted to jump out of his sleeping bag, but he got tangled up in it and spent the next four minutes trying to get out. He finally jumped out and looked frantically around for the Weedle, only to discover that it was still right next to his leg. He looked down at the bug, who chanted its own name happily. Theodore threw a Poké Ball at the Pokémon and it shook three times before catching the Pokémon.

"I'm gonna call you… Larson!" Theodore shouted, happy that he finally caught a new Pokémon. Then he looked at its level on the PokéDex. Level 2. He sighed. It would be a long day of training.


	2. Reece, Caves, and Other Fun

I Suck At Titles Chp. 2

**Author's Note: Hey guys, Constipated Waffle here! I'll be using this section to respond to my anonymous reviews, so just skip down to the story if you don't care about my mindless ramblings.**

**Pikachu0311: I think I had that in my original version, but I lost it all because of a power outage, so I had to rewrite the whole story. It's a male Nidoran at level 10 with Peck, Double Kick, Focus Energy, and Leer. Hope that helps.**

**Javen B: Like a blue Poochyena. Theodore's dream is based on the creepiest dream I ever had btw.**

**Now that that's over with, let's begin!**

"No! Not Harden! Poison Sting! POISON STING!"

It was late in the afternoon when Theodore finally gave up on trying to train Larson. It was actually pretty powerful for its level and managed to start fighting opponents without Gary's help after a bit, but it simply wouldn't follow commands. This wasn't a problem when it was a Weedle, but it had evolved into a Kakuna by now and loved using Harden. Something about being inside a harder shell made him more self-confident.

Theodore returned Larson to his Poké Ball in defeat. "At least you can follow orders, right Gary?" he said to his faithful starter. Gary responded by easily taking out a nearby Machop with a quick Peck. Theodore nodded. "We'll just…go catch another, stronger Pokémon, and hopefully you two will be so good we won't even need Larson for the gym."

He quickly surveyed the surrounding route and decided not to catch any new Pokémon here. Pretty much everyone here had been knocked out by Gary, and Theodore certainly didn't want any bad blood on the team.

"Well, we have two options, Gary," he noted, looking at the map on his PokéDex while picking up his Nidoran. "We can either go back into Hearthome City and go on one of the routes there, or we can continue down this route into Mt. Coronet. Which one do you want?"

Gary stared blankly at his face for a moment, then pointed his horn towards Mt. Coronet. Theodore nodded. "All right, let's go in!"

They was walking over the bridge taking them to Mt. Coronet when they heard a trainer shout, "Hey, you! Wanna battle?"

Theodore turned around and found a boy looking to be about his age, with short, black hair and excitable blue eyes. "Me and my Pokémon have been training and I think we can beat you! C'mon, two-on-two?"

Theodore looked down at Gary, who shrugged as if to say, "Why not?"

"Okay, we'll take your challenge!" Theodore said excitedly.

"Great! Killer, I CHOOSE YOU!" the other boy said releasing a Magikarp.

Gary looked up as if to say, "Is this guy serious?" Theodore stifled laughter and sent out Larson. "Just do whatever, Larson, you can't lose!

**Later…**

Theodore stood in disbelief at his Kakuna, fainted at his left leg.

"How…do you…lose…TO A MAGIKARP?!" he said in disbelief. Gary sat with a deadpan look on his face at Theodore's other leg. "IT ONLY KNEW SPLASH!"

"Okay, second Pokémon time! Go, Bolt!" the other boy shouted, throwing his second Poké Ball. A small bug-like creature with leaf-like antennae and a whitish body emerged and immediately growled fiercely at Theodore, who knew from his favorite TV show Captain Tropius and the Avengers that the Pokémon was a Nincada.

Theodore looked down at Gary and nodded. "Okay, you ready for this, buddy?" he asked. Gary strutted out on the field in confidence. "Okay then! Gary, you're up!"

The two Pokémon stood and stared at each other for a few seconds, then Bolt shot back in a Sand-Attack. Gary jumped over it and delivered a Double Kick to Bolt's side, but to his surprise, the Bug/Ground type took the attack in stride and delivered a Leech Life to Gary. The Poison-type winced in pain, while Bolt looked to be virtually unharmed.

"C'mon Gary, you got this!" Theodore shouted as Gary shook his head and glared at the Nincada again. The bug Pokémon stood there in silence while Gary ran up with a Peck attack. Just as the attack made contact, Bolt got a much harder shell, causing Gary's horn to hit tough skin. Bolt then reached out in a Scratch attack, knocking Gary away from him.

Theodore realized he should be calling out commands to Gary, so he shouted, "Okay, Gary, Focus Energy!" The Nidoran looked back at him like he was insane, but complied anyway and surrounded himself with sparks of energy, pumping him up, before turning around and throwing himself forward in a Peck attack. Bolt easily healed himself with Leech Life the first few times. The sixth time, however, Peck landed a critical hit, breaking through Bolt's hardened skin and knocking the smaller Pokémon out.

The other boy looked down at his fainted bug before shrugging and returning it to its Poké Ball. "A tie, huh? Good enough for me! I'll beat you next time, though! Name's Reece, by the way!"

"Uh, yeah, my name's Theodore," Theodore said, shaking the other boy's hand before returning Gary and sticking his Poké Ball in his pocket.

"See ya later!" Reece shouted, running back towards Hearthome City. Theodore shook his head. That boy sure was excitable.

"Well, time to head on to Oreburgh City!" Theodore said happily, before realizing he was just talking to himself. He felt a bit lonely without any company, so he released Gary onto his shoulder before continuing into Mt. Coronet.

He was met by an entire swarm of Zubat, who flew over his head, forcing him to duck down and avoid their Bite. He saw a Clefairy while ducking, who playfully reached a hand out to him. Theodore reached his hand out to shake it, but the Clefairy clamped down on it and shook him hard before pickpocketing him and giving the money to a nearby clan of Bronzor and Meditite, who all Teleported away with the money.

"Why would Pokémon need money?" Theodore thought to himself, sitting down on a nearby rock to think. Unfortunately, the rock turned out to be a Nosepass, who shook him off indignantly. He landed on a Machop, who angrily started punching Theodore in the nose. Some more Machop were coming to attack when all of a sudden, a crushing sound came from behind.

All the Pokémon ran away while Theodore turned around to see what the noise was. A giant large snake, looking like it was made out of rocks, started making its way towards him. Theodore knew from his dad that the Pokémon was an Onix, a very dangerous Pokémon that would squash its prey to kill them before eating them, and who was perfectly happy to feast on humans.

Theodore picked himself up off the ground-a chore in itself, as he had become a bit chubby over the years-and tried to run, but tripped on his untied shoelaces, causing him to fall down and scrape his knee. The Onix picked him up and started to squeeze hard, and Theodore, wincing from all the pain, tried to kick the rock snake, to no avail. The Onix began to squeeze harder when suddenly, a hard chop to the back of the Onix's head caused him to drop his prey in pain.

The Onix turned around and found itself face-to-face with a Makuhita. The Onix roared and tried to attack, but the Makuhita easily dodged and cracked down on the rock snake's neck, sending it falling to the ground.

"Wow…" Theodore breathed, becoming aware of the fact he was crying in pain. He wiped the tears off his face while the Makuhita walked over and began checking Theodore for any serious injuries. When it found nothing, it nodded and turned around to leave when all of a sudden, Theodore shouted, "Hey! Do you wanna join my team?"

The Makuhita thought for a minute, then nodded slowly and walked over to where Theodore had a Poké Ball in his outstretched hand. With a beam of light, the Poké Ball sucked Makuhita into it, leaving Theodore with the required amount of Pokémon to take on a gym in Sinnoh. He grinned. Time to go get his first gym badge!

**Chris joined the team!**


	3. Bad Blood

I Suck At Titles Chp. 3

It was three weeks later when Theodore finally escaped Mt. Coronet. It wasn't that Mt. Coronet was big or hard to navigate or anything: Theodore is just really, really bad at navigation. Along the way, he managed to figure out how to use his PokéDex as a sort of "team tracker" to find out what level his Pokémon were. Gary was level 14, Chris level 12, and Larson level 7, in all his wonderful glory.

Theodore looked at Larson with a determined face. He was going to get that Pokémon to obey him whether he liked it or not, somehow. "We are going to train you up," he said firmly.

So Gary offered to be Larson's double battle partner. The two wandered through Route 207. Gary caught sight of a Ponyta, and jabbed it from behind with a Peck. The Ponyta turned around, angry and ready to fight, but Gary had long since deserted Larson and the Ponyta attacked him instead. The poor bug type felt burning agony as the Ember Ponyta shot off made contact with his skin, burning it and badly hurting him.

Chris ran over and easily Ko'd the Ponyta, while Theodore frantically tried to save his first catch. Blowing the flames off seemed like a good idea, but it just made the flames worse. He thought about stomping the flames out, but that seemed to have just as high of a fatality rate as just letting it burn.

Just when Theodore had given up on Larson and started to cry fearfully, Chris walked over with a blanket, throwing it over the flames and putting them out easily. Larson paid no attention to Chris, instead walking (or rather, hopping) over to Gary and staring him down. Gary cockily prepped a Focus Energy, but Larson paid no attention to his intimidation, instead throwing a Poison Sting directly at Gary's head.

If Larson having been burned half to death was painful, Gary having all Larson's poison injected into his bloodline was torture of the highest degree. He felt woozy as every single bit of damage, every time he'd been attacked, every bruise he'd ever obtained-none of them could compare to this. He slowly crumpled to the ground, falling in front of the three others looking at him: one satisfied, one horrified, and one with absolute anger in his eyes.

_Chris's POV_

As soon as I saw Gary crumple to the ground, I knew Theodore would be in too much shock to do anything and Gary would need treatment, fast. I pushed Larson to the side, picking up my comrade and making a dash for the nearest Pokémon Center.

I knew Kakuna couldn't carry much poison and other poison types could resist poisoning well, but that much poison was still dangerous to anyone, period. I also knew I couldn't make it to the nearest city in time to save him without any directions on where to go. Fortunately, I didn't need direction when I had Aura on my side. I took a deep breath as I remembered Sensei's lessons: close your eyes to avoid any distractions, then focus on the chi around you. I could sense a very large amount of Aura to my left, so I hoped it was a city and made a dash for it.

I burst through the Pokémon Center doors-easily findable by all the weakened chi given off by weakened Pokémon-and practically threw Gary at Nurse Joy. I dared open my eyes, and saw that the nurses, while obviously disturbed by this interruption, were rather competent at their job, immediately hooking Gary up to a pump and pumping the poison out. I turned around to find Theodore, knowing I could only hope my friend would survive.

_Gary's POV_

I woke up in a weird bed, hooked up to a strange machine which kept pumping in and out. Great, so I was in the hospital with poison related injuries and had no clue where my trainer was. Brilliant. Just brilliant.

I wondered where in my life I had done something to make me deserve this punishment. Sure, I had let that Ponyta attack Larson, but the little jerk had it coming. He had poisoned our food on more than one occasion-which nobody noticed but me since Master got sick and couldn't eat often and Chris is apparently just immune to that kind of thing-and he refused to use anything but Harden-Master just assumed he for some reason couldn't use Poison Sting, which we obviously just found out wasn't true.

I thought about Master for a minute. He was kind and innocent but rather naïve to the ways of the world. He would be worrying about me right now. Too bad I couldn't let him know I was-well, fine wasn't the right word, but I would live.

Speaking of which, I wondered who brought me here. I could name a few reasons Larson wouldn't-lack of hands, rather slow, his burning (literally burning now) hatred of me-and knowing Master, he was too scared to do anything. That left two choices-some bystander, or Chris.

I thought about my surroundings before Larson knocked me out for a moment. We were in a pretty secluded area, with only that Ponyta around to fit the bystander role. That left Chris as my "hero", of sorts.

I had known Chris for, what, three weeks now? Hard keeping time when you've been in a cave, and who knows how long I'd been unconscious-but I digress. Chris was quiet, often meditating silently or musing about his former sensei, but was all in all a good guy. He was powerful in battles-short, sweet, and to the point was his strategy-and seemed to tolerate Larson about as much as I do, which is not at all.

That settles it then. Chris had brought me here and saved me. I would have to thank him when I saw him, though he would probably mutter about how his sensei could've saved me faster. I sighed. He really needed to get over his hero worship.

My thoughts drifted to Larson again. I snarled at the thought of that scumbag. I couldn't wait to get out of here and see how he explained himself in the few seconds before I murdered him.

_Larson's POV_

I sat in the Pokémon Center restlessly. I wondered why it was taking so long to get Gary from his room. I thought about how ticked he'd be at me when he got out. I really didn't care. I whopped him once while half his level, I could definitely beat him a second time while on par with Chris. I had been training in the nearby grass in the four days it took Gary to recover. I was also on the brink of evolution, so there was always that in the rare chance Gary got the upper hand. I was set.

I saw Gary's face as soon as he left his room. I knew he'd be mad, but the look of sheer anger on his face surprised me. I hadn't seen that much anger since… Greta had…

I shook my head. I knew Greta was gone now, I knew that nothing would bring her back. I thought about my hatred of Gary again. I grinned as Gary, still in Master's arms, glared daggers at me. I said, "Hey, don't give me such a poisonous look."

I laughed. I know he didn't.

**Okay guys, looks like that's the end of this chapter! I actually feel a lot more proud of myself with this chapter then I did the last two, so yay me! I'm sorta tired right now, no time to right a long author's note, but if anyone noticed, I implemented a small quirk in the way Larson thinks. If you can figure it out, I'll throw a cookie at my monitor. I don't have the time to deliver the cookie to you.**


	4. Let's All Meet The Obligatory Mentor

I Suck At Titles Chapter 4

"Uh, I'll take 20 Hyper Potions… I guess 15 Revives… maybe 10 Full Heals… and 2 Fire Blast TMs."

"That'll be 63500 PokéYen, Jake," the Poké Mart attendant announced, giving the 16-year-old Pokémon trainer all his ordered items and taking his money. "Good luck on your eighth gym battle!"

"Thanks, Zoey! I may've lost to this gym twice before, but all my training is gonna pay off! I'm going to win this time!" the orange-haired up-and-coming Pokémon trainer shouted as he ran off into Oreburgh City, oblivious to the affections of the black-haired girl who was his friend since they were in third grade. She stopped to wonder if she'd ever get the courage to ask him out. Not now, but maybe one day, when he was Champion…

Jake whistled as he hurried through the streets, hoping he'd make it to his 2:00 meeting with Jubilfe Gym Leader Walter. He checked his Pokétch. 12:52. Just enough time to find an open space, get Blair to Fly to Jubilife, and grab a quick snack. Just as he was rounding the corner to Route 207, he saw a young boy with short, blonde-brunette hair being attacked by a Beedrill.

"No, Larson! Stop!" the boy shouted, trembling in fear, while the Beedrill stabbed forward. His attack was blocked by a Makuhita, who easily absorbed a Poison Sting with its hand and shot Beedrill back with a Vital Throw. The Makuhita looked up at its trainer expectedly, but the boy was too scared to do much as the Beedrill got back up.

"Kelly, go!" Jake shouted, releasing his Politoed in between the boy and the Beedrill. The Fury Attack bounced harmlessly off the green toad's side, and it retaliated with a Focus Blast, easily taking out the Bug/Poison type despite the resist.

"Return your Beedrill," Jake instructed.

"What?" the young boy asked.

"Your Beedrill! Return it before it comes back to its senses!"

"Oh! Right!" the boy replied, stumbling around with a Poké Ball before finally returning his vicious Pokémon.

"You need to listen to your Pokémon more! It kept telling you to return your Beedrill-"

"Larson."

"Larson to his Poké Ball! Why didn't you do what it said?"

"I-I didn't know it said anything!" the young boy sniffled. Right on cue, a Nidoran came walking out of the bushes, looking very angry, very flushed and very embarrassed.

"What happened? Why was Larson attacking?"

"Well, I sorta tried to spank it."

"You… tried to spank a Beedrill? May I ask why, in the name of all that is holy, you tried to spank an aggressive Pokémon like that?"

"He p-put laxatives in my Gary's cereal."

"Where did he get laxatives?" The boy's cheeks turned red as he opened his mouth. "Don't answer that. Why don't we get you to a Pokémon Center and you can tell me all about yourself."

After a few minutes, they had learned all about each other. Theodore was a new trainer from Hearthome and the son of former Champion Arthur Anderson, who dreamed of finding his dad and beating Cecil Cormick, who he believed was responsible for his dad leaving. Jake was a trainer from Oreburgh who wanted to become the Champion so he wouldn't have to work in his life again.

"Well, it's been nice talking to you, but I have to go to my gym battle!" Jake said eagerly. "Don't make Larson angry again!"

"Oh, could you show me the way to the gym here? I've been looking all morning."

"Oh, right! Just go down Gym Leader Roark Lane and then make a turn at Griffith Grocers. You can't miss it!"

"Thanks!" Theodore said, turning around to leave.

"Hold on!" Jake exclaimed. Theodore spun around. "I think Gym Leader Brandon said he'd be out of town this week to deal with family issues."

"Aw, and my Pokémon were all fired up to battle, too!"

"Well… I guess you could come with us to Jubilife and battle Walter there… but he's the toughest Gym Leader in Sinnoh! I doubt you'd be ready to face him…"

"Aw, come on? Please?"

"…Yeah, okay, you can come with us, I guess. But don't say I didn't warn you!"

The two walked out of the Pokémon Center refreshed and ready to go. "Okay, Blair, can you fly us to Jubilife?" Jake said, releasing a three-headed bird. Its necks turned around to survey the area before nodding.

"Yes, I know. You should be glad he didn't hear that." Jake responded. He saw the surprised look on Theodore's face. "Remember how I said you should've listened to your Pokémon? I didn't realize you didn't have a Pokémon translator. It allows you to hear your Pokémon so you can develop closer bonds! You should buy one if you ever see one!"

Theodore looked unsurely at the saddle on the Dodrio. "I thought these couldn't fly?"

"Nope! Blair here falls with style!" Jake jokingly proclaimed. Theodore looked even more confused now. "Never mind. It was just an old movie reference. We really need to get you cultured… anyway, let's fly!"

Theodore climbed onto the bird's back, still a bit scared. Fear turned to absolute terror when Blair began to charge up speed and ran at a nearby building. The Dodrio jumped off the wall onto another nearby rooftop, before launching itself up into the air and gliding along the wind.

"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" Theodore screamed as he grabbed onto Blair's saddle. Jake just shook his head while Blair made another presumably sarcastic comment.

Twenty-three agonizing minutes later, the trio touched down in Jubilife, with Theodore scarred for life and the right of Blair's head with a broken eardrum.

"I would've thought your screaming would've petered out in fifteen minutes…" Jake sighed.

"Can we please just go to the gym?" Theodore pleaded.

"Sure. Just don't be afraid if Walter sends out a Flying-type or something."

As they approached the gym, Theodore got a weird nervous feeling in his gut. "Wow… my first gym battle!"

"Don't get cocky. Like I said, Walter's a really tough gym leader. You'll be lucky to even beat one of his Pokémon!"

The two looked down a dark hallway. Theodore gulped. It was time for his first gym. Was he ready for this? He had a disobedient Beedrill, a nervous Makuhita, and a Nidoran with diarrhea. Then he choked down his words. No way he was gonna be scared of a Gym Leader when his dad was the Champion. He was going to beat this gym.


End file.
